Christopher Reeve Gets Lasker Public Service Award; 3 Win for Medical Research

By LAWRENCE K. ALTMAN

Published: September 14, 2003

A pioneering gene researcher and the discoverers of a powerful therapy for autoimmune disorders are the winners of the 2003 Lasker awards for medical research. And Christopher Reeve, the actor whose struggle against paralysis has given new hope to patients with severe spinal injuries, has won the Lasker public service award.

The awards are being announced today by the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation.

Dr. Robert G. Roeder of Rockefeller University in New York City won the basic medical research award for his studies over the last 30 years into how genes are switched on and off in cells, a process called transcription. It helps determine how all the body's cells, which carry the same genetic blueprint, can perform radically different jobs, such as making a toe a toe instead of a finger.

Dr. Marc Feldmann and Sir Ravinder N. Maini of the Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology in London won the clinical medical research award for a discovery that led to development of powerful drugs that can soothe joint pain and restore mobility among people with rheumatoid arthritis. The therapy, known as anti-T.N.F., for tumor necrosis factor, has also benefited people with other autoimmune disorders, like the bowel ailment Crohn's disease and a form of arthritis caused by psoriasis.

Mr. Reeve was paralyzed from the shoulders down when he was thrown headlong from a horse in 1995. He was honored for transforming his personal tragedy into public service. He is now chairman of the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation and a leading advocate for increasing financial support of medical research aimed at curing not only his own injury, but a wide range of other conditions.

The Lasker committee said it was citing the 50-year-old Mr. Reeve ''for his perceptive, sustained and heroic advocacy for medical research in general and victims of disability in particular.''

The combination of Mr. Reeve's dedication to educate himself about the scientific and political aspects of research and his renown as an actor has allowed him to wield tremendous influence with government officials and the public, the jury said.

Mr. Reeve has regained some sensation in 70 percent of his body and can now push off from a pool wall like a swimmer starting the backstroke, progress that his doctors deem remarkable.

Dr. Feldmann, an Australian immunologist, and Sir Ravinder, who was born in India, overcame major scientific skepticism when they began their anti-T.N.F. work in 1984. It has led to the development of three licensed drugs for rheumatoid arthritis and autoimmune disorders -- Remicade, Enbrel and Humira.

The two worked on the notion that a derangement of certain proteins, known as cytokines, led to rheumatoid arthritis. At the time, many experts expressed skepticism that just one cytokine could act as an alarm to jolt the entire process into action.

But through a series of experiments in animals and humans, the scientists proved that crippling just one cytokine, T.N.F., could soothe a major inflammatory process involved in rheumatoid arthritis.

They began by showing in test tubes that tissue from rheumatoid arthritis patients produced cytokines in an uncontrolled way. Then, after inducing rheumatoid arthritis in mice, they injected an antibody (later known as infliximab or Remicade) to block T.N.F. The treatment reduced swelling and joint destruction in the mice.

In the first clinical trial of the antibody, patients reported remarkable relief of their rheumatoid arthritis symptoms a few hours after receiving injections. Within several weeks, previously incapacitated people were playing golf and climbing stairs, though further studies showed that continued therapy was required to keep the disease in check.

In work that began at the University of Washington in Seattle in the late 1960's and carried on at Washington University in St. Louis, Dr. Roeder, now a Rockefeller scientist, provided an understanding of transcription, the process in which cells transcribe the genetic information in DNA into RNA. The RNA copy of each gene provides the blueprint for the cell to make the protein specified by that gene.

Each cell contains proteins tailored to specific functions. By determining which information is retrieved from DNA, transcription dictates how, for example, a pancreas cell produces insulin so the body can use glucose properly and how red blood cells produce hemoglobin, which carries oxygen.

By reproducing transcription in a test tube, Dr. Roeder developed a tool for teasing apart the process and identifying its vital components.

Dr. Roeder will receive $50,000, and Dr. Feldmann and Sir Ravinder $25,000 each. The public service award does not have a monetary prize. Since the Laskers were first awarded in 1946, 66 winners have later received Nobel Prizes.